Lance Armstrong, left, and Floyd Landis were teammates but could be on the opposite ends of a federal lawsuit. / Martin Bureau, AFP/Getty Images

by Brent Schrotenboer, USA TODAY Sports

by Brent Schrotenboer, USA TODAY Sports

The U.S. Department of Justice soon will have another tough decision to make about Lance Armstrong.

Should it join forces with a confessed cheater - Floyd Landis - to pursue the vast fortunes of his former cheating teammate?

Or should it move on from cycling's vicious cycle ?

After nearly three years of consideration, that's the bottom line now as the government decides what to do with a civil fraud lawsuit filed by Landis against Armstrong in 2010. A decision could come this week. And the stakes could exceed $90 million.

"It is no small potatoes," said Jason Workmaster, a Washington D.C. attorney who specializes in similar cases.

In recent weeks, the federal government has been mulling its options. It could join Landis' suit and seek nearly $100 million in damages from Armstrong and their former associates on the U.S. Postal Service cycling team. Or it could let Landis pursue it on his own .

Filed under the federal False Claims Act in 2010, Landis' suit is colored with irony. A former teammate of Armstrong's on the USPS cycling team, Landis admitted cheating to win the 2006 Tour de France after years of vigorous denials. In his suit, Landis is taking the high ground and blowing the whistle on Armstrong, who cheated to win the Tour seven straight times before Landis.

After years of his own vigorous denials, Armstrong finally confessed to his own cheating in a televised interview last month with Oprah Winfrey. As a result, the Landis case now poses the biggest legal threat to Armstrong's future.

"The lion's share of these cases settle," Workmaster said. "The reason for that is the stakes are so high normally for the defendant. No defendant wants to be in a case where it's 'The United States vs. me.'"

Landis' suit accuses Armstrong and his associates of defrauding the federal government through their use of banned drugs and blood transfusions on the USPS team. Because Armstrong and others engaged in these doping practices to boost themselves on the bike, the suit argues they violated their USPS contracts and that the government should get its money back.

USPS paid more than $30 million to sponsor Armstrong's team for several years. As provided by the False Claims Act, Landis seeks to recover triple that amount for the government - more than $90 million, with Landis getting up to 25% as the whistleblower and witness who brought the case to the government's attention.

But the clock ticks. Normally, the government has 60 days to decide whether to join such a case unless it gets extensions granted by the court, Workmaster said. After nearly three years, the case remains under seal , indicating the government has continued to ask for more time to make a decision and push for a settlement - an effort that recently has failed.

By joining the case instead, the government could increase its leverage by pushing the case to trial, but it would come with risks. It doesn't help the government that the case is nearly 10 years old . Plus Armstrong's attorneys likely would argue that the USPS benefited from the doping scheme and therefore suffered no damages.

According to studies conducted for USPS, the cycling team's sponsorship brought USPS around $100 million in value from 2001-04 through media coverage and other intangible benefits.

"Defendants often attempt to argue that the government got what it paid for so there are no damages," said Michael Morse, a Philadelphia attorney who specializes in such cases. "However, the government could argue that it did not get what it paid for, because (playing by the rules) was a condition of the government payment."

Regardless of any benefits it might have reaped from the doping scheme, Workmaster said the government could argue to the jury that "if they had known there was doping going on, they would not have paid out the money."

On the other hand, Armstrong's attorneys have a good argument, too, Workmaster said. Relevant case law states that when assessing damages in such cases, "you must take into account the value the government got," he said.

Workmaster said if it's determined the government got as much back as it paid out, then "the damages are zero." And if the damages are zero, nobody might get much more than a big waste of time, or $5,500 to $11,000 per false claim in penalties.

But Landis still has much to gain if the government joins his case and proves substantial damages. Workmaster said it doesn't matter if he's a confessed doper himself because whistleblowers often blow the whistle after being involved in the scam themselves.

After confessing to his own doping sins, Landis was among the first to accuse Armstrong of doing the same - an accusation Armstrong shot down with denials and attacks on Landis' character.

Landis' testimony and evidence from other witnesses later helped the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency compile a massive file of evidence against Armstrong - enough to ban Armstrong for life and strip him of his seven titles in the Tour de France.

Under the weight of that evidence, Armstrong finally relented. In January, he confessed to doping from the mid-1990s through 2005 - admissions that could boost Landis' case.

Now it's the government's call. If the government decides against joining the case, Landis still could pursue the case on his own. It just wouldn't bring the same force.

"From a practical perspective, the chances of success are much higher when the government is pursuing it," Workmaster said. "They bring their resources. They bring their name. It's a very different thing for a jury if there's a justice department lawyer accusing a defendant of having defrauded the government than a private citizen making those accusations. The calculus is very different."